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The Beluches, finding that nothing but the coarsest grains were obtainable with the white beads they had received, petitioned for and obtained a shukka, but under the proviso of their always assisting me to urge on the lazy porters. 16th. We started at 6 A.M., and travelled eleven miles to Ukamba, a village in the district of Msalala, which is held by a tribe called Wamanda.
If shoved aside, or pushed with a stick, they show their savage nature by turning fiercely like a fatted pig upon whoever tries to poke it up. 24th. The march commenced at 7 A.M.; and here we again left the direct road, to avoid a third party of belligerent Wamanda, situated in the northern extremity of the Msalala district, on the highway between Unyanyembe and the Lake.
The country still continues of the same rich and picturesque character, and retains daily the same unvarying temperature. On the road we met a party of Wayombo, who, taking advantage of the Wamanda disturbances, had lifted some forty or fifty head of their cattle in perfect security.
We broke ground at 6 A.M., and after travelling through high cultivation six miles, were suddenly stopped by a guard of Wamanda, sent by Kurua, a sultan of that tribe, and chief of the division we were marching in.
We were obliged here to diverge from the proper road via Sarenge, to avoid a civil war the one before alluded to, and to escape which I had engaged the second guide between two young chiefs, brothers of the Wamanda tribe, who were contending for the reins of government on the principle that might ought to give the right.
As the houses were devoid of all household commodities, I asked the people stopping there to tend the fields to explain the reason, and learnt that their fear of the plundering Wamanda was such that they only came there during the day to look after their crops, and at night they retired to some distant place of safe retreat in the jungles, where they stored all their goods and chattels.
The Beluches, rushing through the passages of the palisaded village, suddenly burst upon the enemy, and fired and charged successively; to which the Wamanda replied with equal vigour, advancing with their frog-like leaps and bounds, dodging and squatting, and springing and flying in the most wild and fantastic manner; stabbing with their spears, protecting with their shields, poising with bows and arrows pointed, and, mingling with the Beluches, rushed about striking at and avoiding their guns and sabres.
These Wamanda are certainly the most noisy set of beings that I ever met with: commencing their fetes in the middle of the village every day at 3 P.M., with screaming, yelling, rushing, jumping, sham-fighting, drumming, and singing in one collective inharmonious noise, they seldom cease till midnight.
As in the last place, no milk could be obtained, for the people, fearing the Wamanda, had driven off their cattle to the northward. It is evident, from the general nakedness of the people, that cloth or beads do not find their way much here, which is accounted for by so few merchants ever coming this way.
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